SwIm: Adobe Swatch Exchange (*.ase) Importer Documentation v2.0

Formerly known as CV SwIm

Overview

Cineversity.com'sSwIm: Adobe Swatch Exchange (*.ase) Importer is a plugin for Maxon Computer's Cinema 4D R15+ that allows you to easily bring color swatches into your Cinema 4D projects. The importer has a number of settings which allow you to import swatches in the way that is most useful to you. You can create materials, MoGraph multishaders, gradients, and more.

When paired with a color scheme generator like Adobe's Kuler you can quickly apply a beautiful color scheme to your project. With the check of a single box, you can also overwrite selected materials with a different color scheme - making it incredibly easy to change the overall mood and appearance of your image.

Download & Installation

Note: CV Adobe Swatch Exchange (*.ase) Importer is only available to premium subscribers of Cineversity.com

Login to Cineversity.com.

Visit the CV ASE playlist and click on the file download link.

Open Cinema 4D.

Go to Edit > Preferences.

Click on the "Open Preferences Folder..." button.

Unzip the file you just downloaded into the "plugins" folder inside of the user preferences folder you just opened.

Close and restart Cinema 4D.

You can confirm that the plugin was successfully installed by going to Cinema 4D > Script > Console. There you should see the following message:

Operation

Interface

Update Selected Materials

Before

After

If you are merging in a swatch this command will replace the color chip of the Color channels of the selected materials with the color of the swatch file you are importing. You must select exactly as many materials as you have swatches. Adobe Kuler files typically have 5 swatches. If the luminance channel is the exact same color as the color channel, luminance will be updated to match the swatch as well.

Note: At the moment it is not possible to update shaders, just materials.

Create Materials

If you open or merge an *.ase file with this option active a new material will be created for every single swatch in your ASE file. The color in the the color the luminance channels will be updated to match the color of the swatch, although luminance will be deactivated by default. If the swatches in your file have names the material names will be updated to match, if not they will be given the default name "Swatch".

You might also notice a series of headings appear at the top of your Materials Manager. These headings are layers which have been created to match any swatch groups/folders from your *.ase file.

Create Shaders

The Create Shaders option allows you to quickly toggle off the creation of a number of different shaders. Simply having this option turned on will not necessarily create any shaders, one of the specific shader options (e.g. MoGraph Multi Shader) must also be active. For each shader you choose, a new material will be created for every swatch group, assigned to a layer, and renamed to match the shader it includes.

MoGraph Multi Shader

This option will create a MoGraph Multi Shader containing any ungrouped swatches and a separate Multi Shader for each swatch group in your ASE file.

How to assign a randomly selected swatch to each clone

Create a MoGraph Cloner object.

Drag the shape you would like to clone into the Cloner.

Import an *.ase file, be sure that Create Shaders and MoGraph Multi Shader are active.

Apply the shader to your clone.

Select your Cloner object.

Add a MoGraph Random Effector.

On the effector's Effector tab...

Change Min/Max Minimum to 0%

Change Random Mode to Sorted

On the Parameter Tab

Turn off Position

Change Color Mode to On

If you don't like the color distribution, change the seed value on the Effector tab.

The MoGraph Multi Shader applies colors based on their color brightness. The Random Effector set to random sort mode with color turned on applies an evenly distributed black->white gradient to your objects and then shuffles their which shade is attached to each clone. This ensures and even distribution of colors to your clones.

Colorizer Shader

Gradient Shader

Update Quick Storage

Create Null

Known Limitations

Update Selected Materials only updates the color of the selected materials. It does not support replacing MultiShaders, Gradients, or Colorizers.